Floorstanding loudspeakers — Grandinote MACH 8 XL

The MACH 8 XL is a crossover-free floorstanding loudspeaker from Grandinote, the Italian company of owner and designer Massimiliano Magri, which also builds amplifiers that combine valve and solid-state ideas. The model had its North American premiere at AXPONA 2023 and sits in the brand's MACH range of large speakers without crossovers.

Key specs that matter

Each tower carries eight 16 cm full-range drivers, used unfiltered and unequalised, together with one horn compression tweeter. Frequency response runs from 19 Hz to 20 kHz, sensitivity is 98 dB at 1 W/1 m and nominal impedance is 8 ohms. The cabinet measures 174 x 34 x 34 cm, and a single pair of binding posts is placed low on the rear panel. Grandinote offers black and grey tulipwood finishes and a five-year guarantee, and set the price of a pair at EUR 24,000 including tax.

Engineering and use context

No capacitors, inductors or resistors stand between the amplifier and the eight woofers, and the horn tweeter gets only a simple first-order high-pass. Without reactive parts in the path the impedance stays linear, the amplifier sees a high damping factor and crossover phase shifts are avoided. Filtering is done mechanically instead. A special treatment behind the membranes stops cone break-up, so the drivers roll off naturally above about 13 kHz, while the horn handles the harmonics above roughly 7 kHz. The enclosure uses Grandinote's S.R.T. (Semi Resonant Tube) loading, which Magri places between bass reflex and transmission line - a tube that ends in a large downward-firing port. Low-frequency extension comes from the combined radiating area of the eight drivers, so each cone moves only a little for a given output. The cabinet is made of reinforced MDF, with matte black laminate on the baffle and rear panel and grey wood laminate on the sides, and it rests on a metal plinth with threaded inserts for spikes. Grandinote designs and builds its products in Rea, in the province of Pavia.

Pairing

Since nothing filters the woofers, the resistive, sensitive load suits single-ended Class A valve amplifiers, other low-powered valve designs and Grandinote's own amplifiers. The cabinet size and bass extension call for rooms of 30 m2 and more.

Alternatives

The Grandinote MACH 9 is the other large crossover-free floorstander in the MACH range.